Geoffrey Kazinda, the jailed former principal accountant in the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM), struggled in the dock yesterday to rebut new corruption charges brought against him.
Kazinda is battling 18 new charges, which include abuse of office, and causing financial loss of more than Shs 316m. He is jointly charged with Beatrice Kezabu, the former OPM assistant resettlement officer, Shamim Masembe, the proprietor of Total filling station in Ntinda and Hussein Katumwa, the station manager.
Prosecution at the Anti-Corruption court claims that the four forged fuel vouchers for trucks transporting relief items to northern Uganda. The trucks are purported to have consumed fuel worth Shs 316 million from the filling station whereas not. Kazinda, the prime suspect, stepped into the witness dock first but his performance came under sharp scrutiny from the trial judge Lawrence Gidudu.
Kazinda first questioned the auditor general's report, the basis for his prosecution. He said it was full of inaccuracies and inconsistencies but the judge wasn't convinced.
"Mr Kazinda, is that your defence?" the judge asked. "Because a lot of things were said about you by prosecution witnesses," he added.
"You're not directly answering to the allegations. Were you prepared for this [testifying]?" he asked.
Speaking in a very low tone, Kazinda then changed strategy, this time focussing his defence on attacking Pius Bigirimana, his former boss and permanent secretary, OPM. Bigirimana was used as a key prosecution witness in this particular case.
"My lord, I found it strange that the PS [Bigirimana] came here and told lies that I had knowledge of any theft yet he acknowledged the transactions. Actually he is the last person to sign," Kazinda said.
Kazinda said whatever he sanctioned, Bigirimana approved, yet he was the only one charged.
"I was just part of the process. The documentation wasn't primarily done by me," he explained, adding, "The documentation was first prepared by the contracts committee then it goes to the procurement and disposal department then it comes to me. What I did was to sanction the transactions and also the permanent secretary [Bigirimana] did the same."
He said that he, as the principal accountant, wasn't in touch with the bidders.
"I didn't know the bidders because as the principal accountant, you never interface with them. Even before I could be transferred to the OPM, the records show that fuel was got from Total fuel station in Ntinda," Kazinda said.
Kazinda said that much as he is accused of causing financial loss to government, the [governments] books of accounts do not support that charge.
"Everything was delivered. No one is saying that the food wasn't delivered to disaster-struck areas and no one is saying that fuel was never bought," Kazinda said.
"There was no fraud and there is no reason for me to believe that there was fraud."
Kazinda also attempted to criticize Justice Gidudu's earlier ruling that he (Kazinda) had a case to answer. But the judge stopped him in his tracks.
"You [Kazinda] are not competent to comment on my ruling. You're simply not competent, leave that to your lawyers," an angry judge said.
The judge also took a swipe at Kazinda's previous lawyers.
"I don't know which lawyers were representing this man [Kazinda]," Gidudu said, "Were you [Kazinda] paying them? Because it seems they didn't know what they were doing."
Kazinda was sentenced to five years in prison by the Anti-Corruption court. Justice David Wangutusi handed Kazinda five years for abuse of office, two years for forgery and another two years for unlawful possession of government stores.
dkiyonga@observer.ug
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